Take with a pinch of sodium chloride

Our adverts now come laden with a dazzling array of scientific claims - from 'unique amino
complexes' to 'revolutionary moisture formulas', it seems we can't buy anything unless it has the
approval of boffins. But what does any of it mean !argaret !c"artney examines the suspect
science that we swallow, apply and absorb every day
Thursday August 18, 2005, Guardian
#hen $ was growing up, the hard sell in adverts was sex. %adies lying in rippling fields, languidly toying with
chocolate bars, mysterious men leaping through windows while clutching a box of !il& 'ray, that sort of thing. $t
was pretty steamy, if pretty harmless, but it wor&ed. (ex sold. 'here was a bit of sort-of science about) *airy liquid
gave your mother soft hands, nine out of +, cats preferred a particular brand. But it was rather soft stuff.
'hese days, however, sex is old hat, and the new hard-sell is science. -nd properly hard science at that, or so one
might innocently presume. .ver since /ennifer -niston told us that the 0science bit0 was coming in a commercial for
%'Oreal .lvive, there has been an increasingly dazzling proliferation of science in our adverts. 01ure extracts0,
0spring water concentrate0, 0unique amino complex0 and 0a new generation of ingredients0 are the &ind of thing we
now expect to find in our shampoo2face cream2loaf of bread) curiously, 0clinical tests0 always seem to reveal that
345 of women find said shampoo2face cream2loaf of bread of 0proven effectiveness0. -nd if an advert says
something is 345 effective, that must be right, mustn't it -fter all, you can't 6ust go on telly and ma&e up statistics,
can you
#ell, no, you can't. 7esterday the *rench cosmetics giant %'Oreal was forced by the -dvertising (tandards
-uthority to withdraw a ma6or ad campaign after ma&ing claims for two products, -nti-#rin&le 8e-"rease face
cream and 1erfect (lim anti-cellulite cream, that it couldn't bac& up scientifically. 'he '9 ads, which starred "laudia
(chiffer, claimed that :;5 of women had 0visibly reduced expression lines0 after using -nti-#rin&le 8e-"rease, and
that :+5 of women found that 1erfect (lim 0visibly reduced the appearance of cellulite0. 'he -(- found there
wasn't enough evidence to support either claim, and the ads will now have to be amended. $n !ay, similarly,
advertisements by .st<e %auder were also found to be misleading.
(o do these companies simply lie %'Oreal, which made =+.>bn profit last year, insists not. $n a statement
yesterday the company said it disagreed with the verdict and that any claims it ma&es for its products are
0substantiated by scientific evidence and customer research0. #ho to believe #hat soon becomes clear is that
even when a manufacturer is not, strictly spea&ing, telling an untruth in its advertising, the 0science bits0 its telling
you are highly unli&ely to be the full story.
'a&e 1antene 1ro-9, which has recently been telling us, via shiny spreads in various magazines and '9 ads, that
its -nti-Brea&age (hampoo, will lead to 0up to 3?5 less brea&age in 6ust +, days0. (mall print at the bottom of the
page tells us that testers loo&ed at 0brushing damage, shampoo and conditioner versus non-conditioning
shampoo0. 'his is presented as credible science, but credible science involves doing things in a certain way. @ow
many people, for example, too& part in the trial A1erfect (lim, the -(- found, was tested on 6ust >B women,
meaning that the number of women who noticed a difference was in fact only 4>.C 8id the participants &now what
&ind of shampoo they were using or were they 0blinded0 to it, as they would have been in a serious scientific trial,
and as did not happen in the case of 1erfect (lim 8id the company run a proper comparison of shampoo and
conditioner of their brand against both types of product from another brand
$ decide to find out. -fter several phone calls over several days, $ am put through to one of 1antene's senior
scientists. @ow were the tests done, $ as&. -ll methods related to this are commercially sensitive, 8r (teve (heil
says, but he does tell me that he and his team tested +, samples of hair, three times, with reproducible results. 'he
results were 0significant0. But how significant can testing +, hair samples three times really be 8oes he really
thin& that this is credible enough science to serve as the foundation for a ma6or, science-based advertising
campaign 0-ll the claims have to be cleared by the Broadcast -dvertising "learing "entre,0 he says, and here he
is quite right. 'he B-"", which is funded by the advertisers themselves, approves adverts for television by vetting
them before they ma&e it on to our screens Ait approved the contentious %'Oreal adsC. $t insists that claims made
during television advertising must be substantiated, and it will refer to a body of scientific and medical consultants
in contentious cases.
.ven so, it's arguable that small studies of this &ind, carried out in what amounts to secrecy, aren't much of
substantiation for anything. 'hey provide a cloa& of scientific credibility, but they don't undergo the analysis that
occurs when science appears in the harsher world of scientific publications. @ow is an ordinary consumer to find
out what the research actually involved.
"laire *orbes is director of communications at the -dvertising (tandards -uthority. (he says that there are firm
guidelines as to what can and cannot be claimed in advertising, but the -(-, with a staff of +,,, has no legal
standing to regulate advertising. (taff loo& at all the ma6or newspapers daily, but with an estimated 4,m adverts
printed every year in the DE, it is impossible for them to loo& at them all. $nstead the authority relies on public
complaints, +>,,,, of which are made annually. *orbes cites the recent case of a slimming pill whose advertising
was withdrawn after ma&ing claims that were found to be based on a study on 6ust >> people. 'he -(-, after a
complaint, decided that this was too small a study to be valid.
0'al&ing generally, we may accept a small sample size as reasonable proof, but this would really depend on the
statistical significance of whatever tests were done,0 *orbes says. 0"onditional claims lead to a host of different
claims, especially when 'modal verbs' are used. #e might as& them to change 'can' to 'could' if they didn't have
+,,5 proof of the 'can'. But we would also expect them to hold proof relating to the 'could'.0
But weasly verb tenses aren't the only problem. $t's also the way the research is conducted. 'a&e an advert for
another %'Oreal product, Fevitalift. $n 0clinical tests0, according to the ad for the cream, of >, women 0345 say their
s&in felt softer, and :35 say their s&in was firmer with each application0. $n G,,>, %'Oreal spent H?,,m A=4>,mC on
research and development, so you'd expect some really vigorous analysis - perhaps the use of a dummy cream or
ordinary moisturiser to act as a contro. $ as& Benedicte de 9illeneuve, scientific advisor for %'Oreal 1aris about this.
0"arrying out a placebo-controlled test does not ma&e much sense in our industry as a cosmetic product is a
balanced and precise mixture of cosmetic ingredients and its effectiveness relies on this specific combination of
ingredients,0 he emails in response. But why can't not use some bog-standard emollient as a control, so that the
consumer at least &nows whether this product, or nappy cream, is better
8iscovering the 0truth0 about hair brea&age or s&in firmness is not, granted, the stuff of life or death. ln any case,
scientific truth is more often about revealing degrees of certainty than it is about finding rare absolutes. But rubbish
science in face cream adverts may end up undermining the proper science we read about in the stories next to the
adverts. -nd it is not only beauty products that use sort-of science to sell.
$n the DE, several medicines that have come 0off prescription0 and are now available for over-the-counter purchase
use standard medical 6argon in their adverts. 8o the medicine companies do any better than the cosmetics
companies
Iocor @eart-1ro provides one very good example. 'his medication, a dose of +,mg of simvastatin, is a type of drug
which lowers cholesterol, and has been available to people with heart problems or who have high ris&s for heart
disease for many years. $t was previously only available on prescription, but in /uly G,,>, it was reclassified,
enabling it to be sold from pharmacies at a cost of =+G.33 for a GB-day supply. 0@eart disease is the number one
&iller in the DE,0 says a spo&esman for !cJeil, the company which manufactures Iocor, 0and any proactive steps
that we can ta&e should be applauded.0 'he pac&aging and promotion say the drug 0effectively reduces the ris& of
a heart attac&0 by 0preventing build up of harmful plaques in your coronary arteries0 and 0reducing your ris& of
coronary heart disease0.
'he problem, however, is that ta&ing simvastatin in the dose at which the drug is available over the counter A+,mgC
has never been directly proven to be beneficial for people in the moderate ris& category, at whom the drug is
targeted. 8r $&e $heanacho, editor of the 8rug and 'herapeutics Bulletin, a 6ournal published by #hich Aformerly
&nown as the "onsumers' -ssociationC, says) 0'he &ey issue is that of evidence. $f you don't have evidence to
6ustify claims of benefit, then the whole argument begins to fall apart. -nd the evidence that this KIocor @eart-1roL
will significantly reduce the ris& of a heart attac& in the target group is at best flimsy.0
- recent edition of the 6ournal highlighted &ey concerns about over-the-counter 0-statin0 drugs. 0$t's not an attac& on
statins per say, which are crucial treatment for many patients,0 $heanacho says. 0But there is a lac& of evidence that
Iocor @eart-1ro will do any good - its case relies on circumstantial evidence that has been extrapolated. 'his is
being presented as a scientific certainty when it is anything but.0 @e also ta&es issue with the initial adverts Asince
changedC for Iocor @eart-1ro which stressed that the ris& of a heart attac& was up to 0one in seven0, without
pointing out that that this ris& was over a +,-year period. 0.ven health professionals may have been confused by
this omission. (o how was the general public not to &now that this didn't mean, for example, that there was a one in
seven chance of dying of a heart attac& the next day $n our view, giving examples of ris& selectively in this way is
impossible to defend.0
'he !edicines and @ealthcare 1roducts Fegulatory -gency A!@F-C is responsible for ensuring that medicines
advertising is not misleading. $n a statement, the agency said that it had considered a complaint about the way the
ris& of heart attac& was expressed by the Iocor @eart-1ro advertisements, but did not uphold it. 0#hile
ac&nowledging that how ris& is expressed and how it is understood is a difficult issue, with the need to stri&e a
balance between unduly reassuring and alarmist messages, the agency too& the view that the advertisements
encouraged people to see& advice from their pharmacist who is best placed to give a fuller explanation of the level
of ris& and alternatives for reducing it.0
1erhaps people will, when it comes to medicines. 'hey almost certainly won't see& advice over yoghurt drin&s, for
example, which are suggested as an aid to 0digestive health0. 'here is scant evidence that drin&ing these &inds of
drin&s will put one's digestion bac& on trac&. 7et the claims made by the manufacturers are so vague, how are we
to ob6ect to them.
$s this really good enough Beauty cream consumers may tread a precarious balance between the sceptical and
the credulous, but in medicine and food advertising too, buyers should beware. !ar&eting and science have got
together and bred a weird hybrid form of sales-experiments that have ta&en over our advertising culture. 'he next
time they get to 0the science bit0, don't forget to add a pinch of salt. -s %'Oreal's customers have discovered, much
of what we are told might 6ust as easily be science fiction.